


Blazing Orange and Bright

by Katie_with_the_Tea



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Fluff and Angst, Greif., Post-Battle of Hogwarts
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-12
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2019-10-26 17:46:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17750561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katie_with_the_Tea/pseuds/Katie_with_the_Tea
Summary: The battle was over and they had won.In the wake of war, Harry and Ginny find each other again.





	1. Chapter 1

The battle was over and they had won. It was hours and hours later, now. Ginny couldn’t know how many, but she was bone weary and tired.

She had dozed fitfully, first on her mother’s shoulder in the Great Hall, and then somehow she had found herself in the Gryffindor common room, dozing in a wide armchair. She didn’t know how she got there; she couldn’t recall the trek through the halls and up the stairs. She couldn’t remember eating anything, or if she’d spoken to anyone. Her mind was numb. All she saw were faces of the friends she had lost, and Fred, swimming through her mind’s eye. All she really heard were their voices, playing over and over again in her head, mingled with the sounds of the battle.

Ginny was vaguely aware of her family somewhere in the room with her, but she didn’t know how many of them were there--just that Fred wasn’t. And she could distantly hear the familiar voices of fellow or former Gryffindors--Neville with his grandmother, Dean and Seamus, Demelza, and someone she thought might be Angelina, maybe Alicia. But she was keenly aware that there were several missing.

Out of the corner of Ginny’s eye, she saw Hermione emerge from the boys’ staircase, looking like she’d just woken up. She couldn’t muster up the energy to make a comment as she would have normally and she felt a pang at the comment that didn’t come from George, and would never come from Fred.

A lump was beginning to form in her throat, but she fought it down, not quite ready to give in to her grief yet. She wanted to feel nothing, to keep feeling nothing, to wrap herself in this numbness for as long as possible because the alternative would hurt too much.

Ron came down shortly after and went straight to where Hermione and their mother were talking.

It took a few minutes before Ginny realized her gaze had shifted back to the bottom of the boys’ staircase. And then another before she admitted to herself that she was waiting for the last person to come down, waiting for Harry. Just as she always had. Ginny wondered if she would always be waiting for him.

Ginny dozed off again before he came down.

It was dark in the common room when she awoke. The dying fire in the grate and the nearly full moon shining through the window were the only sources of light. Someone had lain a blanket over her where she was still curled in the armchair. In the dim light, Ginny saw lumps on the floor that she could only assume were her family and others who needed a place to sleep, curled inside cushy sleeping bags.

Ginny moved her head from where it was resting, and with a start saw that someone was sitting opposite her. Her heart slowed from a furious hammering to a quick flutter when she recognized the silhouette, even after all these months. Harry was sitting on the sofa across from her, knees pulled to his chest, chin resting on them as he stared into the dying fire.

Ginny stretched her neck and readjusted herself, still looking at him.

Harry lifted his head toward her, alert to her movement. She didn’t say anything. Neither did he. Even with several feet between them, Ginny sensed him tense as he noticed she was awake and that she had noticed him. Was he nervous?

Ginny couldn’t take her eyes off his face.

Perhaps it was this that triggered it, him being just steps from her, close enough to touch if she wanted to.

Before Ginny knew what was happening, before she could stop herself, there were tears rolling down her face. She sniffed, trying to stem the flow, but that only seemed to make it worse. With her next breath she was sobbing.

Harry was on his feet and crouching in front of her in less than a second, the quick flash of his silencing charm barely noticeable. In another moment, his hands were cradling her face and his thumbs were on her cheeks, repeatedly wiping away the wetness there. She clutched at his wrists, a silent entreaty to stay close. His bright green eyes searched hers with worry and Ginny’s face crumpled with more tears.

“Ginny....” His voice was strained, tired, but she could hear the emotion in it, the longing to know what he could do to help her.

“I can’t believe you’re actually here,” she said around the large lump in her throat. Her voice was thick with tears and it was all she could manage before she let everything spill out of her--all the worry for him and Ron and Hermione, all the frustration at being left behind, the unfairness of the Carrows, the loss of some of her closest friends and brother, the relief that he was _here_ and it was _over_.

He pulled her tightly to him and she fisted her hands into the front of his shirt, clinging to him as if her life depended on feeling him solidly against her. Hot tears washed down her cheeks onto Harry’s neck and shoulder, drenching the collar of his shirt as she pulled raspy breaths into her lungs, whole body shaking as she breathed out. He shifted them so they were both squashed in the chair together, as close as they could physically get in that moment, no matter the discomfort.

Ginny didn’t know how long she cried for, but Harry’s presence was like a balm. He held her tight, murmuring things in her ear, expecting nothing of her. She felt safe, wrapped in his arms, safer than she had felt in nearly a year.

Eventually the tears slowed, her breathing calmed, punctured by the occasional hiccup and shuddering breath. She felt lighter, though her eyes were gritty and there was a pressure in her head she knew wasn’t going away anytime soon. She wiped her nose on her sleeve, knowing it was gross, but she couldn’t bring herself to care.

Harry was still. Ginny lifted her head and met his eyes, glimmers of green and amber in the firelight. He lifted a hand to her face, brushing hair from her forehead and away from where it had stuck to her cheek from her tears. His eyes searched hers, but neither said a word. Ginny hiccuped, feeling like she could cry all over again at the tenderness she saw in his expression; it was such a relief after the past year, to have him here with her and know that there was nothing standing between them anymore.

She rested her head on his shoulder again, and closed her eyes, content for now with the silence. There was plenty of time to talk later. She felt herself drifting off again with the comforting weight of Harry’s arms around her and the sound of his slow, deep breathing beneath her ear. The scent of him brought her back to long, peaceful hours spent by the lake. He rested his chin against the top of her head and let out a deep sigh, shifting slightly to get more comfortable. She might have imagined it, or dreamed it, but she thought she felt the ghost of a kiss brush across her forehead. She was asleep before she could think more about it.

And so they slept - cramped in a tiny chair, and wrapped around each other so tightly, as if neither would ever let go again - until the sun blazed orange and bright through the window the next morning.


	2. Chapter 2

The first thing Harry noticed as he slowly woke from a deep and restful sleep, was that he was hot, clammy, and his neck hurt. The rest of him still ached, too, but the neck pain was a different kind of pain, the kind you get from sleeping at an odd angle. As he moved his neck to relieve the pain, eyes blinking blearily in the brightness of the early morning sunrise shining through a cracked window, he realized his left arm was asleep. A faint, flowery scent filled his nose, and his mind clicked into place. He squinted down at Ginny, legs draped over his, her head nestled on his shoulder, the source of the loss of circulation in his arm now apparent. They had fallen asleep squashed together in a chair.

Harry blinked rapidly, trying to expel the tiredness from his eyes. Ginny was curled around him, breathing deeply in sleep, still. Even though he had lost sensation in the tips of his fingers, he couldn't really bring himself to shift and relieve the numbness. Ginny was more beautiful than he remembered, even in sleep and even with the clear evidence that she had fought a battle and had been crying the night before. Harry decided that if he could keep staring at Ginny while she slept, the fact that his arm was now going numb didn’t really matter. He could watch her for hours, days, even, he thought.

Harry couldn’t resist reaching up to touch her face. He lightly caressed her cheek, skirting around a darkening bruise, brushing away some stray hairs. Ginny stirred, and blinked open her eyes. It took a moment, but eventually the brown eyes focused on his. They were still red and raw from crying, he noticed, but that didn’t make her any less beautiful to him. She rubbed the sleep away from her eyes, yawning, and stretched her arms and legs out long. Harry pulled  his arm from behind her and rubbed the feeling back into it. Ginny shifted to get comfortable again, replacing her legs over Harry's and resting her head on the back of the chair, tucking her hands into her lap. She looked at him, a small smile tugging at the corner of her mouth.

They were both silent as they stared at each other. There were so many things he wanted to say to her, so many things to explain, but he didn’t know how or where to start. “Hello” seemed too trivial; jumping right into an explanation seemed too much.

Ginny saved him by asking the obvious.

“Are you okay?” she whispered as if trying not to break the spell of the quiet morning. Harry couldn’t really answer that, so he shrugged.

“Are you?” he asked. Ginny shrugged too.

“I’m sorry about Fred,” Harry whispered. “And...and everyone else.”

“Don’t blame yourself, Harry,” Ginny said gently. She had to know that was what he was thinking, too: that if it weren’t for him, if he’d just been a little bit faster, a little bit more cunning, they would all still be alive. “They all had a choice. _We_ all had a choice.”

“Why didn’t you go back to the Room of Requirement?” he asked quietly.

“Would you have done?” was Ginny’s wry, whispered reply. No, he wouldn’t have, and she knew it. Could he really blame her for joining the fray?

Harry didn’t know what else to say, so he looked about the room, noticing the lumps of others who were still curled up in sleeping bags on the floor. It must still be quite early. The brunt of the damage on Gryffindor Tower, Harry knew, was higher up, in some of the boys’ dormitories, and most of the girls’. The common room,  however, was mostly, blessedly, undamaged with only a few blown out windows and some cracks on one of the outer walls, and he basked in the homeliness and familiarity of it.

The wandering of his eyes was merely a distraction, a stall until he could figure out what to say. It was awkward, feeling so close to Ginny, like he could say anything to her in the quiet of morning and as if they’d never been apart. And yet he felt so far from her because he didn’t know where to start and he knew she’d been through so much while they had been apart.

When he ran out of things to look at he returned his gaze to her. She was still looking at him, searching his face for something.

“What is it?”

Her brows furrowed. “I don’t know....you look different somehow.”

Harry grunted out a laugh. “I need a haircut, badly.”

“Maybe,” Ginny said but she didn’t sound or look convinced. Her eyes focused back on his though. “So… what happened out there?”

Harry sighed. Ginny knew how to cut to the chase. It was one of the things he admired about her.

“Where do I start?” he said with a grimace. 

Ginny didn’t say anything else, but waited patiently for him to find the words to tell her even just a fraction of everything that had happened since August. But he did find the words eventually.

Some things were too difficult to talk about - Ron leaving, Godric’s Hollow, Malfoy Manor, Dobby. He could tell that she knew he wasn’t telling her everything, and that she was holding back from asking more. But he would tell her when he was ready.

He owed her that much, to tell her all this. He had left her with no warning, no explanation, no goodbye. She hadn’t needed one nor expected one, he knew. But she deserved to know, perhaps should have known some of these things sooner.

He told her what he could: where they went, why they left, what they were doing, how much he missed her. He told her about horcruxes but not what they all were. He told her about being able to see into Tom’s mind to know what his next move was.

He told her what he had learned through Snape’s memories, knowing that she would be the last person he told the whole truth to. He told her about the walk into the Forest, how it felt to know he was going to die, how he came back and how Narcissa Malfoy lied to get them back into the castle.

Harry wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but the sun shining through the windows was growing steadily brighter.

Ginny had tears in her eyes again by the time he was done.

“I can’t believe you did that,” she said. “That you would have died for us.”

“I _did_ die,” Harry insisted.

Ginny took one of his hands in hers. It was such a familiar gesture that he couldn’t believe it had been nearly a year since he’d held her hand. He squeezed her fingers and then threaded them through his own. Ginny continued. “But why did you...come back, I guess. I mean, I'm glad you did, obviously, but… Wouldn’t it have been easier to just...go on?”

Harry thought a moment. “For some, yeah.” He paused, wondering if he was ready to admit it, but figured if anyone would understand it would be Ginny. “I thought about it,” he said softly. “It _would_ have been easier, to just be done. It was so tempting, to be able to give up all the burden of… of everything. Ron and Hermione knew enough to finish it. I walked into the forest knowing I wouldn’t be coming out again. I was ready to give it all up.

“But since I was given a choice… Voldemort has always been my fight.” He shrugged. “I wanted to finish it. And--” he stopped himself, unsure he was ready to say more out loud, but Ginny caught it 

“And what?” she said cautiously, as if unsure she wanted to hear it.

Harry brought in a deep breath and let it out slowly through his nose, steeling himself. He had not planned on revealing this part so soon to her. He wasn't sure he was ready to share how deeply he felt for her. It was the sort of vulnerability he’d never truly experienced before.

“I saw you on my way into the forest,” he said softly, not quite meeting her eye. Ginny looked sharply at him, sitting up a little straighter to look at him better. “You were comforting a girl outside the castle. You were the last person I saw. Well, the last one I remember seeing.” Harry swallowed and looked down to fiddle with the frayed hem of his shirt sleeve. “After I knew what I had to do, once I’d accepted that it had always been my fate to die - it wasn’t so hard to do it. But seeing you….” Harry swallowed around a lump that had formed in his throat. 

“I almost stopped. I hesitated. I wanted to be able to say goodbye.” Ginny squeezed his wrist and he looked up at her. “I’m sorry I couldn’t,” he whispered, searching her face for… something. Forgiveness maybe. “I wouldn’t have been able to do it, to walk into that forest. If I’d stopped.”

Ginny nodded, pressing her lips together, probably in an attempt to hold back the tears he could see forming in the corners of her eyes.

“They say your entire life flashes before your eyes when you’re about to die. I don’t know if that’s really true, that everyone sees that. But I _can_ say that my entire life flashed before _me_.” Ginny’s chin was trembling faintly and he knew that this was difficult for her to hear. It was hard enough for him to say it, to relive it.

He put his hand up to her face again, just to feel that she was there, to give him strength, to know she was real and alive, next to him. He ran his thumb along the freckles of her cheek bone and she leaned into his hand, bringing hers up to grasp it, not breaking eye contact.

“You were the last thing I thought of as the light of the curse rushed toward me,” he said, so quietly he could barely hear it himself. “The day we first kissed, right here in the Common Room. I’ve never been as happy anywhere as I am with you. _You_ are the most important reason I came back. Ron and Hermione could have handled the rest of it without me; he’d still be finished if I’d died. But I couldn’t stand the thought of leaving you forever.”

Ginny was full out crying again now. It wasn’t the sobbing of last night, but there was a steady stream of tears, and plenty of sniffles. She was still clutching his hand against her face, and Harry twined his fingers through hers and rested their hands on their knees between them. She let go of his other hand to swipe the sleeve of her shirt across her cheeks.

“Oh, Harry... When did you learn just what to say to a girl?” she asked half-joking. Harry grinned.

“Sometime between sneaking into the Ministry and breaking into Gringotts.” He played with the ends of her hair with his free hand.

Ginny shook her head and gave a soft snort as the last of her tears slowed. “You should have seen Bill’s face when he heard - a mixture of admiration and complete shock.”

“Yeah, he warned us not to get involved with goblins. He was right; Griphook double-crossed us. But we really didn’t have any other choice.”

“And I’m pretty sure Charlie’s going to want to know what it’s like to ride a dragon; even he hasn’t managed that.”

Harry smiled again. “I’ll still take a broom any day.”

They were silent for a few moments, listening to the sounds of the people sleeping around them and the birds beginning to wake outside. It seemed so strange to hear bird song after such a fraught time, that something so _normal_ could be happening after such great loss. Harry looked out the window to the tops of the trees in the forest, once again thinking back to that night knowing he was about to die.

“Hey,” Ginny whispered softly, squeezing his hand. He looked up and she gave him a soft smile. “I don’t have quite as hefty of a confession, I suppose, but you should know... You’re all I thought about most days. The usual stuff, you know, if you were safe and eating alright. Where you were. How much I _missed_ you. But I wondered if you were thinking of me too, and if I’d ever see you again.”

Ginny let out a forceful sigh. “When I saw Hagrid -” she stopped as her voice cracked with emotion, swallowed. Began again. “When I saw Hagrid carrying you… For a moment it didn’t matter that he’d won because what would my life have been like if you weren’t in it? I didn’t even want to think about it.” She ran her free hand along his, tracing the tips of her fingers gently over his knuckles, causing goosebumps to ripple up his arm like little jolts of electricity straight to his spine. His heart was filled with such strength of feeling for this girl in front of him that it was everything he could do to let her finish and not snog her senseless.

“It seems silly to think about it - we’re so young, I’m not even of age yet - but -” her eyes met his again - “You mean more to me than I think anyone could ever comprehend.”

Harry was quiet for a moment, heart pounding again, even as the most amazing feeling of contentment washed over him. He watched her, searched her face, thinking of what to say to that.

“I feel the same,” he said lamely, mentally kicking himself. It sounded so stupid after what she’d just told him.

But Ginny grinned. “You mean more to you than anyone else could understand?”

Harry snorted and shook his head. “No,” was his simple reply. He watched as Ginny's eyes flicked down to his lips as she licked her own. His heart was hammering furiously in anticipation of what he was sure they both wanted. Another breath of silence and then Harry reached and placed his fingers under her chin, tilting her face toward him. “No,” he whispered. “Just the opposite.”

And then he closed the short distance between them and finally captured her lips between his. The hand that wasn’t holding his snaked up his arm to his shoulder and clutched it tightly. Ginny made a soft mewling sound, opening her mouth to him, sliding her tongue along his. He let go of her hand so that he could bury both of his in her sweet smelling hair, cradling her head just above her neck, hardly believing that he was kissing her again. He never wanted to stop and he’d do anything to be able to kiss her like this every day for the rest of their lives.

The portrait hole opened and they jumped, breaking apart, and turned to look over their shoulders. It was some younger students heading out and they didn’t glance in Harry and Ginny’s direction, seemingly not even realizing they were there, for which Harry was grateful. He didn’t need anyone but Ginny to know where he was at this moment.

It was still very early, but it seemed the castle was waking.

“You must be exhausted,” Ginny whispered. Harry looked back at her. Even in the orange light of morning he could tell she was flushed, and her breathing was heavy. So was his. Harry nodded. “Me too.”

“Do you want to go somewhere else?” he whispered even softer than before. “I don’t want to be around other people just yet.”

Ginny cocked her head and smiled a little.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’d like that.”

After a quick glance around the room to be sure they were still alone, Harry stood and pulled his Invisibility Cloak out of his pocket. As Ginny stood, he wrapped it around both of them, then clasped her hand in his and started toward the portrait hole.

“Why did we never use this brilliant thing last year? We could have gotten away with so many more things...” Ginny wondered wistfully.

“Is that a proposition?” asked Harry, unable to disguise the rise of hope in his chest that she was thinking along the same lines as he. Apart from being here with Ginny, he felt a little thrill that he was doing something as normal as sneaking away for a good, private snog.

There was a mischievous glint in her eyes as she replied, “Why don’t you find out?”

She pulled on Harry’s hand and led him through the portrait hole and down a corridor. And Harry knew that even though there was still so much to do, so much to work through in the aftermath of this great battle, he and Ginny would be just fine.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry and Ginny begin to process their grief, finding comfort in each other.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the wonderful comments! Initially this was going to be just the two first chapters, but some of your comments got me thinking and then I had to write more. I hope this one holds up to the first two. :) Enjoy!

“Do you think anyone’s looking for us?”

“I left the map up in the dormitory. Ron probably saw it. They’ll know we’re okay and hopefully have enough sense to not come looking for us.”

Ginny nodded and leaned further into Harry behind her. She was sitting with her back against his chest, nestled between his bent legs, as they stared out at the Black Lake, hidden in their favorite spot behind some willows. Harry’s chin was resting on her shoulder, arms wrapped loosely around her and back against a tree. She traced her fingers along his forearms enjoying the eruption of small goose pimples that followed in their wake. 

“I wish we could stay here forever,” she found herself saying. She watched as a small bird flew back and forth in front of them, dipping and diving, catching bugs off the surface of the water. “I don’t want to go back inside.” Her voice shook and Harry sat up straighter, pulling her more tightly into his arms. A few tears leaked down her cheeks and she swiped them quickly away, already sick of the grief welling up from her chest but not ready to let it go. It was strange to remember that just the night before she’d been grasping to hold on to the numbness she’d felt after it all ended. She would love to feel numb again; this hurt too much, to feel the gaping hole in her heart where Fred should be.

She felt Harry’s lips press into her hair.

“I know,” he whispered.

“Out here I can pretend everything is fine,” Ginny found herself confessing bitterly. “I’m not reminded of all the horrible things that happened here this year. I can pretend Fred and Colin and Tonks and Lupin are still alive…” More tears fell, and she shut her eyes tight, trying in vain to stem the flow. Harry’s arms tightened around her again and she tilted her head so her cheek rested on his upper arm. 

“I’m sorry, Ginny,” he said quietly. After a few moments, she took a few deep breaths to calm herself. “I wish I could have been here,” he continued. “Was it… was it really bad?”

Ginny swallowed with some difficulty, nodded and simply said, “Yeah.”

”Will you- Will you tell me about it?” he asked hesitantly. 

Ginny turned to face him and looked at him for several moments before answering. “I will, but not today. I can’t think about it or talk about it right now. Not with Fr-Fred...” She shook her head as more tears fell. She wanted to tell him, but the words wouldn’t come. It was hard enough to think about the past year on its own, but on top of her grief over the death of her brother and close friends… She wasn’t ready to talk about it.

Harry nodded. He would understand in his own way, when the words finally came, and he would tell her, again, that he was sorry, that he wished he could have been here. Which somehow made it all better and worse at the same time.

Ginny took another deep, calming breath, then tried to give Harry a reassuring smile. Harry’s hand reached up to wipe her cheek as he nodded his understanding. She cleared her throat in an attempt to clear her head.

“Did you get this looked at?” he asked looking at something on her face. “You’ve got a bruise. Looks painful.”

Ginny lifted her hand to lightly touch her cheekbone. It didn’t hurt much. When had she gotten it? She couldn’t even remember having been hit in the face. “It’s not bad,” she told him. “Probably looks worse than it is.”

Ginny turned back around and pulled Harry’s arms tight around her, once again marvelling at how safe she felt with him there, and how much comfort she drew from being wrapped up with him, finally after months of waiting. She missed this. If it wasn’t for the grief pressing down on them, the too-raw memories of what had happened just the day before, it could be one of their stolen moments by the lake a year ago. Was it really only a year ago? It felt like a lifetime ago.

They sat in silence watching the animals around the lake go about their mornings, waking up and catching their first meal of the day. There was some sort of creature swimming along the banks, popping its head up between clumps of grass every now and then. A long legged bird she couldn’t remember the name of was stalking among the reeds, just as she’d seen one do in the pond at the Burrow. 

“When do you think we can go?” Harry asked, startling her out of her contemplation.

“To the Burrow?” She felt Harry shrug behind her, and Ginny didn’t have to look at him to know he was probably aching to feel at home again. She was too, and hadn’t been gone nearly as long as he had.

“Just go,” he said. “Doesn’t matter where, I suppose. I just… don’t think I want to be at Hogwarts right now.”

Ginny squeezed his hand. He must hate this, seeing this place that was his home so...unrecognizable. 

“Nothing’s stopping us from leaving, is there? Though who knows what state the Burrow’s in. No one’s been there in weeks. For all we know, Death Eaters could have razed it to the ground,” she said bitterly, shredding blades of grass in her hands to keep her emotions in check.

Harry’s grip tightened as he tensed. “I hope not,” he said. He was quiet for a moment and what he said next belied the casual tone from before. “I don’t have anywhere else to go.” He said it softly, with a longing and vulnerability in his voice she’d never heard before. He sounded… lost. It was unnerving, Ginny realized. He’d always spoken with such purpose before, and despite everything, or perhaps because of it, he always seemed so sure of himself. 

Ginny straightened and turned to look at him again. “Your home is with us, Harry, no matter where we end up,” she said gently but firmly. Harry kept her gaze a moment, nodded, then looked back out over the lake, swallowing audibly. Ginny watched him closely as she asked gently, “What are you worried about?”

Harry didn’t answer right away. He continued to stare out at the water, absently fiddling with some fringe around the hole torn in the knee of his pants. He sighed. “It’s just… Hogwarts was the first place I really felt like I belonged, like it was a home. And now….” He left the sentence unfinished as his voice wavered. Ginny squeezed his hand as she turned to the lake again. She understood.

“Yeah, I know.” She didn’t want to say aloud what either of them were thinking. How could she ever look at it again, step foot inside its walls again, and not be reminded of the horrible things that happened? Now it was tainted with so much death and destruction and loss. 

“Did you know Remus and Tonks made me Teddy’s godfather?” he asked quietly. 

“No, when did they ask?”

“The night he was born. Lupin came to see us at Bill’s,” Harry sighed heavily. “I never actually thought -” His voice caught. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I never thought I’d need to…”

“You’ll be a great godfather, Harry.”

“He never even got to know his parents,” Harry said tightly. “He’s only a few weeks old.”

Ginny turned again, this time coming to her knees, sitting back on her heels. She gently rested her hands on Harry’s shoulders, forcing him to look her in the eyes. “I wish Teddy could know his parents, too. But he won’t have the same childhood you did. He’s got you, and Andromeda. Me and the rest of my family. He will be so loved, Harry. By all of us. Just like you are.” She was close to tears again, could feel them working their way up her throat and her voice shook. Did he know how much she loved him? Harry was near to crying, too; she watched as he blinked and a few tears fell down his cheeks. He nodded, not quite meeting her eyes, sniffling, but didn’t say anything more.

Ginny rose to put her weight on her knees and wrapped her arms around him, pulling him as close as she could in her position. His legs fell to rest completely on the ground as his arms came around her tightly and he buried his head in her shirt. She felt him take a deep shuddering breath, but otherwise he was completely silent. Sensing his own need to be closer, wanting to be closer, too, she shifted her legs so she was sitting in his lap.

It wasn’t the most comfortable position to sit in, but she’d been in much worse recently. And she’d suffer through any discomfort if she could keep Harry close to her like this all the time, to offer him even a small measure of comfort. She held him, wondering if anyone had ever seen him cry like this before, if he’d ever let himself cry like this before. There weren’t any words she could find to comfort him right now, but perhaps that was okay. Perhaps words weren’t needed, and being there was enough.

Harry lifted his head as his tears slowed, avoiding her gaze. She watched him; his eyes were rimmed in red, but still so brilliantly green they took her breath away. He gave one large sniffle again, wiping his nose on the cuff of his sleeve, and Ginny felt a little jolt as she saw a glimpse of what he would have been like as a child, small and scared and un-comforted because his relatives wouldn’t have cared enough to even think to offer it. It brought a strange sort of fury to her heart.

“Sorry,” Harry said hoarsely, cheeks slightly pink, noticing the wet patch he’d made on her shoulder.

“Don’t be. Call it even,” she said with a watery half-grin. He grinned too. “Besides, I doubt this will be the last time one of us cries on the other.”

“No, probably not,” he said softly. Ginny smiled fully at him and then leaned forward to kiss him gently on the lips. She’d only meant it to be a short but firm peck, but Harry clearly had other ideas. He followed her as she began to move away, snaking one hand into her hair to hold her close, recapturing her lips with his. She felt that familiar swoop in her middle, the one that always happened when Harry kissed her like this, like she was the only thing in the world that mattered, like she was the air he needed to breathe. She definitely was not complaining. Harry could kiss her like this every day for the rest of her life and she’d never get sick of it.

It was some time later, after they’d fallen back to lay side by side on the damp grass, alternately kissing and just looking at each other, that Ginny noticed how high the sun was and asked if maybe they should think about heading back inside. She was quite surprised that no one had come looking for them, map or no.

Harry made a noise that sounded like half a groan, half a sigh, and rolled to his back scrubbing his face with his hands. “I wish this was easier,” he said. “I know there’s people up there waiting to talk to me, to hear what happened. I’m not ready to talk about it yet.”

“So don’t,” Ginny said simply as she sat up. “You don’t owe them anything, Harry, and in fact, I think one could argue that they owe you quite a lot.”

Harry lifted his hands to look at her, narrowing his eyes discerningly. Ginny rolled hers and said, “I just mean that you deserve the chance to… relax. Recover. This year was hard for all of us, you especially, and yes, there’s a lot to do, a lot to fix. But you don’t have to be the one to do it. I don’t think anyone who truly understands, or cares about you, will begrudge you some time for yourself. And if they do - fuck them. You just rid the world of the Darkest wizard it’s ever seen; they have no right to ask any more of you.”

She stood up, taking her wand to dry off the dampness on her clothes from laying in the grass.

“Come on,” she said when she was done, holding her hands out to him. “We don’t have to talk to anyone we don’t want to, but I think Mum will start to worry if we don’t get back to her soon.”

Harry took her proffered hands and allowed her to help him to his feet. She performed the same charm to dry his clothes. He tucked his Invisibility Cloak under one arm and took her hand with the other. The silence between them was comfortable, punctured only by the sounds of morning - singing birds and the light breeze in the trees - as they walked back up to the castle. The grounds were still mostly empty, though she could see a few people picking their way around the debris of battle, using their wands to move large pieces of rock and rubble that used to be part of the castle walls. It looked like they were trying to organize things, preparing to clean up the grounds and hopefully begin repairs to the school itself.

They were nearly to the front doors when Ginny broke the silence to ask Harry something that had been on her mind since the night before.

“So… what’s with Ron and Hermione?”

Harry snorted. “They stopped dancing around each other and decided to snog instead.”

“When did that happen?” Ginny asked, feeling unexpectedly elated given everything else that had happened.

“What time is it?”

Ginny looked down at her watch, confused, but it was smashed and had stopped working. “Around eight, I suppose?” she guessed from the way the morning sun was slanting over the grounds.

“About thirty six hours ago, I think? More or less.”

Ginny’s eyebrows shot up in shock. “You mean…”

Harry nodded. “Right in the middle of the Room of Requirement. Right after you left, actually.” He grinned a bit ruefully.

Ginny didn’t say anything for a moment, still shocked. “Well then. Whatever works… I guess? What made them...?”

“Drop everything and snog? Ron thought someone should go warn the house elves so they could leave if they wanted to.”

Ginny felt a strange sort of laughter bubble up from within her and before she could stop it, she let out a loud guffaw. She clapped a hand over her mouth. “Oh my god,” she said between giggles. “So Hermione…”

“Made the first move, yeah,” said Harry nodding as he grinned.

“Oh my god,” Ginny repeated, still giggling. “I can’t believe it.”

“You can’t believe it? Think how I felt,” Harry said incredulously. “Right in the middle of a battle, and they’re standing there snogging.”

Ginny looked at Harry a little sympathetically and smiled at him, squeezing his hand. “Yeah. But at least they finally got it out. I can’t believe it didn’t happen sooner. Weren’t you all cooped up in a tent together the better part of this last year?”

“The atmosphere wasn’t exactly ripe for romance,” Harry said wryly.

“There’s my silver lining,” she said, trying to keep the mood light. “I knew it was there.” She grinned at Harry and squeezed his hand again. He stopped them near the shattered greenhouses and looked down at her suddenly serious again. 

“Ginny, you know I - that there was never any -” She leaned up and kissed him.

“I know, Harry.” He looked relieved. “You didn’t ask me to wait for you - I know you’d never have done that - but there was never any question about it for me.” 

“Me too,” Harry said quietly. “You’re-” he swallowed, but couldn’t seem to find the words for what he wanted to say. Instead he ducked his head and kissed her, fiercely, and Ginny could feel how much he loved her, even if he couldn’t say it. She hoped he could feel it too, in the way she clung to him, the way she held his head in her hands and his body close to hers. 

A faraway shout brought them back to themselves sometime later and Ginny said, a bit dazed, “Come on, Mum’s probably worrying.” She took his hand but tucked herself close to his side, still wanting to be as close to him as possible.

Feeling a little lighter after the time alone with Harry, Ginny let mouth form a contented smile, not allowing herself to feel guilty for being happy with Harry, in this moment, telling herself Fred and Colin and Tonks would never begrudge either of them this little slice of happiness in the wake of so much hurt and loss. She knew it probably wouldn’t last, this little buoyant bubble they’d formed around themselves for the moment. They still had so much more to say and tell each other, so much grief to process, but it was a start, at least.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea how much more I'll do on this, but I would like to explore the aftermath a bit more, particularly in how Harry and Ginny handle it all alone and as a couple. So for now expect at least a few more chapters.
> 
> Comments are great encouragement! ;)

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed this. Feedback appreciated - please be kind. :)


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